


The Call

by Karasuno Volleygays (ToBeOrNotToBeAGryffindor)



Series: Sportsfest 2018 [112]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: M/M, Sad Drunk Suguru, TLC, mentions of violence and verbal abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 05:35:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16235222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToBeOrNotToBeAGryffindor/pseuds/Karasuno%20Volleygays
Summary: Kuroo was surprised he got the call to shepherd Daishou home after a party until he saw the guy looking like the world just ended. So he did what any decent frenemy would do, he did his best to scrape it back together.





	The Call

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Untitled](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/422843) by gogoshiki. 



> This was written for Sportsfest 2018 remix round. It's also the first kuroshou I ever did and man I fell hard for these snarky fuckers.

The air in the house stank of sweat and spilled booze, along with a sizeable cloud of smoke. Kuroo’s nose scrunched in distaste at the smell, but he went in nonetheless. He had to.

Well, no, he actually didn’t. In fact, Kuroo couldn’t come up with a single reason why he should help the guy he was there to pick up other than it would be a ton more embarrassing for Kuroo to chauffeur his drunk ass home instead of his mother coming to collect him.

As much as their past conflicts would have excused Kuroo deleting the text he’d received about a half hour ago — he almost did — when his hand had hovered over the Delete Text button, he stopped. If  _ he  _ was getting a text about this guy, then that meant there was literally nobody else.

Nobody deserved that. Not even Daishou Suguru.

So Kuroo found himself scouring a raucous frat house looking for his old volleyball rival, sidestepping people in various states of dress and sobriety while he sought his quarry.  After a few pointed questions and some near-misses with rocket-vomiting pledges, Kuroo finally found him.

And man, did Daishou look like shit.

Huddled in a corner of a room full of people groping each other, Daishou sat on the floor with a trail of dried blood tracking from his upper lip all the way down the front of his hoodie, and his nose sat visibly crooked on his face. The part that struck Kuroo, however, were the salty trails of dried tears on his cheeks and the utter despair in his posture.

“I can’t even make fun of you when you’re all sad and pathetic like this,” Kuroo said with a snort, but Daishou didn’t even raise his head. Scowling, Kuroo shook his head. “This is sad, even for you.”

He waited for Daishou to snap to life, to leap to his feet and insult Kuroo like he usually did, but his head merely hung a little bit lower than it did before. 

“Ah, hell.” Kuroo squatted in front of Daishou, lifting his chin with a finger and inspecting his battered face. Daishou’s entire nose was purple, as was the area around his right eye and a spot on his jaw. “Oh, that’s totally broken.”

Daishou met his gaze for a moment before drooping back against the wall. “Doesn’t matter,” he murmured, wrapping his arms around his waist and shivering despite the relative warmth in the room from the press of sweaty bodies.

Shaking his head, Kuroo looped his arm in Daishou’s and hauled him to his feet. “C’mon. Let’s get you home.”

At last, Daishou showed a flash of life and yanked himself out of Kuroo’s grasp. “Leave me alone, all right.” Even as he said it, however, he bit his lip and choked on a sob. “Just . . . don’t.”

“What the hell happened?” Kuroo demanded, unwilling to make a trip this far and not collect his unexpected charge. “You look like you made out with a blender.”

Daishou coughed out a humorless laugh, his breath reeking of alcohol, and leaned against the wall. “Mika broke up with me.”

Kuroo raised a brow. “And then she kicked your ass?”

“Ha. Ha.” Daishou made a half-hearted attempt to swat at Kuroo that came up woefully short. “And she showed up with some other guy.”

Groaning with something bordering on sympathy, Kuroo said, “That sucks. Still doesn’t explain how you ended up looking uglier than usual.” The bait fell unheeded between them, and it didn’t take long for Kuroo to figure out that Daishou’s ruined face wasn’t what was troubling him. “C’mon, spit it out.”

Looking up at Kuroo dolefully, Daishou answered in barely more than a whisper. “I didn’t like how he talked to her. Told her where to sit, where to go, ordered her around like she was some  _ thing _ . So I told him he was being a dick, and he punched me a few times.” Daishou shrugged at that but shook as he finished, “And then Mika told me —” He lolled his head back, and a fresh stream of tears wet his cheeks. “She said she never wants to see me again.”

Every scrap of will leached out of Daishou, and Kuroo own throat was tight as he pulled Daishou close for an awkward embrace. “Breathe, man. Just breathe.”

Kuroo let Daishou empty his grief onto the shoulder of his hoodie, running a hand up and down his arm until his whole body felt like it had stopped shaking. His own eyes were a little wet just hearing his old frenemy in pain like that.

Finally, Kuroo said softly, “C’mon. Let’s go, Suguru.”

Taking a deep breath that didn’t turn into a sob, Daishou croaked, “Who called you?” The words were distorted by his damaged nasal passages.

“Mika did,” Kuroo admitted. “She texted and said she was worried about you but she didn’t have a way to stay here with you. I’m guessing that’s her boyfriend’s doing.” At Daishou’s almost comically shocked face, Kuroo couldn’t even muster a laugh. “She probably told you to scram to keep him from doing the same to her.”

Daishou deflated all over again, and Kuroo draped an arm around his shoulders and guided him toward the exit of the house, keeping him steady as he trudged through the room.

Kuroo suggested a trip to the hospital, but Daishou refused, so they landed in an all night pharmacy for a nose splint and headache medicine for the hangover Daishou would definitely have, courtesy of the booze and the beating.

They ended up at Kuroo’s house, his parents long asleep, and Kuroo worked to scrub the blood and tears from Daishou’s face until he looked like a person again and not a mangled piece of meat. Once Daishou was about as tended to as Kuroo was able, Kuroo tossed him some shorts and a t-shirt and gave the bed a pointed look. “I’ll take the floor.”

Daishou opened his mouth, ready to argue, but Kuroo snapped his mouth shut with a finger tucked under the jaw. “For once in your life, don’t argue with me.”

And he didn’t. Instead, Daishou changed gingerly, revealing a host of bruises hidden by his clothes, but before he slipped under the covers, he took Kuroo’s hand and said quietly, “Thanks, Tetsu.”

The sound of his given name so familiar on Daishou’s lips elicited a strange sensation in Kuroo’s belly, but this wasn’t the time to dissect that kind of information; it was time to nod and say, “G’night, Suguru.”

As Kuroo burrowed into the well-used futon he kept in his closet, he wondered when they had rounded that corner, diverging from unsubtle jibes and insults to . . . whatever this was.

But the longer he considered it, the less he cared. So he and Daishou had grown up, and the way they saw each other wasn’t the same anymore. Though the circumstances surrounding it were unfortunate, Kuroo thought as he drifted off to sleep that it was a change he could more than live with.


End file.
